


The life I lead now

by SmeagolMyNeagol



Series: The Salvation of Kylo Ren and his Redheaded General [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Bottom Kylo Ren, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Hux Redemption, Kylo Redemption, Kylo Ren Redemption, M/M, Note to author: adding the prefix holo to regular words doesn’t maje them sci-fi, Top Armitage Hux, a gentle and loving relationsip is my fetish, kylo is soft and delicate, loving relationship, so is hux
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-29
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2020-03-29 13:12:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19020619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SmeagolMyNeagol/pseuds/SmeagolMyNeagol
Summary: A continuation of my previous fic in this series which can be found here:Gently, Ridiculously So. You must read that fic to be familiar with what is happening in this one.Hux never imagined that this is what his life would become. There's a startling kind ofrightnessabout it all that hits him now and then. It hits him when he wakes up next to Kylo in the early morning. It hits him when Kylo turns to kiss him, those plush lips meeting Hux's own. It hits him when he tells the man he loves him, only for Kylo to echo the words back to him through breathless shuttering, as if Hux is the most precious treasure to him.Some things about their new life, however, are not perfect. There's a massive hole in Kylo's heart where the great loss he has experienced lives. Hux is determined to fix that hole by any means necessary.





	The life I lead now

**Author's Note:**

> Please read part one of this series before reading this. Thanks!
> 
> Note: this story contains regular modern day tech, but with the prefix ‘holo’ before it, as if that makes it somehow characteristic of a galaxy far far away...

These days, Hux’s life is so different from what he imagined it might become that sometimes it all catches him off guard. Sometimes, in the early mornings, before Ren wakes up and they both rise for the day to attend to their respective duties, Hux takes to studying the lines of Ren’s face, marveling at how relaxed the other man is, how much younger and innocent he looks, and it hits him how odd it all is.

When Ren shifts back into the curve of Hux’s body on the bed, essentially _snuggling_ further into the redhead’s embrace, the raven’s silky curls tickling his face, Hux is hit with the realization of the oddity that has become his life.

It hits him when Ren transitions from his deep sleep into a semi-responsive state, eyes misty with sleep, a slow smile curling on his face as his hands reach down to cover Hux’s own, which are stroking up and down the length of Ren’s abdomen absentmindedly.

It hits him when he leaves for the day, boarding his cruiser and heading to the Finalizer to attend to business, but not before Kylo kisses him softly, _everything’s always soft with this man,_ a content smile forming on those plush lips as the knight pulls back, eyes all sweet and earnest like Hux is the greatest treasure in the world to him.

It hits him when he returns home after work, the entirety of which was interrupted by invasive thoughts of Ren at every moment of solitude, and when he enters the misty glade where the entrance to the palace he calls home is located, only to be intercepted by Kylo before he can even enter, it hits him hard. When Ren kisses him again for the second time that day—but certainly not the last—the knight’s hands coming up to tangle in Hux’s hair compulsorily, as if he had been _dying_ to get those huge hands in Hux’s red strands, it hits him. When Hux responds in kind, one hand reaching up to thread into dark curls, the other going down to grip the underside of Ren’s knee so he can lift the raven’s leg up and wrap it around his waist, _as though they’re teenagers in a cheesy holomovie,_ it hits Hux.

It hits him when they eat together, bantering about various events they both encountered during the work day, Ren’s eyes shining in mirth when he laughs at something Hux said, and the feeling of warmth spreading through Hux’s chest, making a smile curl onto his face seemingly without his permission. When they go to bed later that night, tumbling against each other, hands desperately reaching at sheets, the softest mewls leaving Ren’s lips as Hux takes him, the feeling of being whole, of _completeness on an emotional and spiritual level,_ it hits Hux.

The first time he says it is just after they return from a trip across the galaxy. Things on the Finalizer were busy the entire trip, and Hux was up late nights the entire journey and back preparing, and Kylo was likewise occupied. They resolved to stay in separate rooms for the duration of the trip, what with their sleep and work schedules being so erratic. It was the first time since the beginning of their new life that Hux and Kylo slept apart.

The redhead was exhausted from the trip, muscles aching as he made his way out of the cruiser, brushing off the servant who greeted them upon landing, heading across the glade to enter the palace, in need of some rest. He was halfway there before noticing Kylo wasn’t with him. Glancing back, nearly dead on his feet, he snapped out of it when he saw the other man.

Kylo was standing, frozen, in the middle of the glade, the mist wrapping around him like a full-body halo, taking in his surroundings with a smile on his face, breathing deeply through his nose as if to savor every aspect of the place. He locked gazes with Hux, the soft smile widening, “I’m so happy to be back home,” he said softly, the quiet phrase traveling across the silent glade to Hux ears, punctuated by the raven’s head tilting, seemingly in awe of his surroundings, his soft curls jostling against the side of his face.

That was it. That was all it took. Hux felt a blush spread through his face, enamored with the whole image, with Ren’s open appreciation for their home—as though he forgot the beauty of it all during their six-week trip—with the raven’s downright _adorable_ demeanor. All of a sudden it was like his feet were carrying him to Kylo of their own accord; he swooped in close and took Kylo’s face in his hands—exhaustion temporarily forgotten—and met the knight’s lips with his own.

Kylo, for his part, was stunned by the quick change of tone, but returned the kiss after several beats, opening up for Hux so trustingly, as he always did, allowing the redhead to take the lead, hands roaming up and down the expanse of Hux’s back gently. _Everything always so gently._

All the happiness and _rightness_ of the way Hux’s life ended up after so much scrounging and scraping and suffering for something more within the First Order filled him with overflowing warmth, the very idea that he could be this happy was unthinkable not long ago. Hux pulled back, resting his head against Ren’s, standing on his tippy toes to do so, “I love you,” he said, stroking Ren’s prominent cheekbones, his words said so softly he would have thought Ren incapable of hearing them, if not for the raven widening his eyes.

Ren’s hands came up to rest on Hux’s, holding them to his face, eyes shining with unshed tears, “I—I love you too,” he shuttered out, as though the words had traveled from deep within him.

For a moment, they stayed like that, frozen in the green of the glade, the atmosphere calm and quiet around them, ambient noises of the surrounding forest filtering in from the distance. The spell was broken by the servants, their little legs finally catching up to their two masters’, carrying the luggage from the cruiser through the glade and towards the palace.

 

 

Since then, Hux says it more often. He doesn’t overuse it, not wanting to devolve their relationship a completely sappy predictable holomovie, but sometimes, when the moment is just right, he can’t help but let it slip. Ren always blushes prettily when he says it, returning the sentiment with either a declaration of his own love, or just by kissing Hux till they’re both blue in the face.

Hux sometimes falters, encountering new and unusual predicaments in their relationship, but they’ve fought the worst fights before they became romantically entwined, so Hux considers the little squabbles between them to be nonissues for the most part. Hux lets himself feel everything as it comes, and though it’s terrifying at times, its never because he fears what others might think of him. He never fears letting himself feel because of how his subordinates or Snoke may come to view him because of his emotions, because it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks anymore, it only matters what Kylo thinks, and the raven is in much the same boat as Hux these days, a boat at sea of tumultuous waves of previously suppressed emotions.

Kylo is sweeter and more caring than Hux could have ever imagined him to be before their new life began. And more than that, the man is level-headed and resourceful in a way he never could be when he was denied the emotional ties he now has.

It only occurred to Hux that the Dark was finally completely absent from inside him when he mentioned his mother one day.

“I think it would be nice to see her. I don’t know if she’d like to see me though,” Ren had said absentmindedly when the two of them were pilfering through Ren’s old photo albums, a keepsake he had barely managed to conceal from Snoke. For a while, it was lost to even Ren’s own consciousness, back when he was in the deepest throes of the Dark.

The picture that instigated Ren’s comment was one of Leia, her hair not yet grayed by time, the smallest bundle in her arms, a tuft of black hair peaking out from the top of it. She was staring at the bundle, a small smile on her face, clearly not meant for the camera, but one born of the joy in her heart for the child in her arms.

“I do want to see her,” he sighed, “I want to get back what I had before, but…” Ren’s eyes were downcast, a hand rubbing at the back of his neck nervously, “I don’t want to do anything to make her suffer, and seeing me, the source for all her pain, will surely do that.”

Hux watched as Ren flitted through more pictures, trying to focus on Ren’s attitude but finding it difficult as each page of the album showed more and more pictures of a young boy with a big nose and goofy ears, smiling with childhood innocence.

At the beginning of their new life, Ren spent months in turmoil at all he had done. As more and more of the Dark left him, he took to locking himself in his rooms for hours, at first. Hux quickly put a stop to his solitary suffering, begging the raven to _please, share this with me. Don’t shut me out._

Kylo had spent so much time crying out the pain at both the losses he had endured, and the fact that he was the hand that caused those losses, though Hux was adamant that the Dark was more to blame than the victim of its power. Still, Kylo suffered with that burden.

But recently, the man was able to look back at his life, look back at what he had lost, and just… be okay with it. He seemed to have accepted it. Only the faintest bit of wistful sadness permeated his stature when he talked of his family and his past now.

“I think she would want to see you, too,” Hux responded after a while, trying to be delicate but reassuring. Though he didn’t know Leia personally, he had come to understand that _Resistance types,_ those enamored with the Light, were often quick to forgive, sometimes even to their own detriment. Though forgiveness of Kylo would never be to the detriment of anyone, Hux was sure.

“I think she would understand. She would accept it. To have her son back in some way would only help her now,” Hux shifted closer on the floor to where Kylo had wedged himself between the caf table and the sofa, bringing the man’s head down to rest against his shoulder, stroking through black hair softly.

Ren didn’t say anything, wrapping his arms around Hux’s torso to embrace the man fully.

Hux wanted with all his being to give Kylo happiness, but some things were out of his personal reach. Leia and the resistance had scattered after Rey rejected Kylo’s proposition to rule the galaxy together, the few fighters had taken their ships and were hiding on some remote island, too few in numbers to begin fighting anew anytime soon. Only the faintest of whispers around the cities of major planets told rumor of where they were hidden, and none of them were reliable enough nor corroborative of one another for Hux to justify spending military resources on so few insurgents.

With the relative peace of the galaxy, Kylo saw fit to deactivate many of their military reserves, allowing storm troopers, higher ranking officers, and many others to return to their home planets for the first time in… well, for some, they returned home for the first time in their lives.

With depleted resources, Hux found he was at an impasse on how to deal with the resistance. They were surely not a threat anymore, but the possibilities for closure to Kylo that they presented was what Hux was really after. He would find Leia.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Did you like this? I hope so. I know it was probably OOC for both of them, but I just need some reprieve for these boys. I know the rise of skywalker film is probably going to disappoint me when it comes to one of these characters, possibly both. But hey, I can dream about Kylux happening, can't I?


End file.
